Subject: Re: [asa] on science and meta-science

 
Dear Cameron:

Thanks much for your informative post. I also appreciated Behe's response to the question posed, especially the first aspect of the question. The jerky vs. smooth evolution aspect of the question seems a different issue, but Behe did a nice job of separating that from the question that interests me, and he did a nice job of distinguishing science from philosophy and theology.

His post again reminds me why, among the arguments of ID-advocating scientists, I respect Behe's thinking most (even though I disagree with many of his conclusions). He's simply claiming that some things in nature can be shown to be designed; other things might be designed too but not in a way that mere mortals can objectively know (the leaves on the lawn analogy). In principle, perhaps, one can imagine that most natural things arose via a mixture of design and nondesign, but in practice separating out those components is impossible in many if not most cases. For Behe, it's enough to say that there are at least some cases where the design component is objectively, scientifically detectable (and as you know, I remain unconvinced). But again, at least he's clear. Here's how he put it:

"Yet even if one thought that all events fell into either of the two categories "lawful" or "guided," there is no need for any observable history of the world to reflect that. The two categories could be so intimately intertwined that no observation could disentangle the two. Nonetheless, I don't think one has to view events falling into two discrete categories, designed versus not designed. There are some Christians (the über-philosopher Alvin Plantinga is one, I think) who view *everything* as intended. As far as design theory goes, they may well be right. That is, God may indeed have intended each and every event that ever occurred in our universe. However, the question for science is, what events can we from the empirical evidence conclude were designed? That is what ID theory is concerned with."

Indeed. Philosophers (like Plantinga) can legitimately propose, for example, that everything is designed. What they should not do is claim that Behe told them so!

Behe explicitly distinguishes his philosophy/theology from Plantinga's. Note that he's not saying his science is incompatible with Plantinga's philosophy/theology, he's just saying that multiple philosophical/theological views are compatible with design, and his and Plantinga's differ:

"My own view is that there is real design in the universe and also real contingency. That is, there are events whose outcome, although permitted, was not specifically intended for themselves by God. (Harkening back to the cartoon example above, God may in fact not have intended that specific, apparently random pattern of leaves on my lawn, and I see no particular reason to think that He did.) There are also events that were specifically intended by God, in my view. As I try to explain in The Edge of Evolution, the more we know about nature, the more deeply into life specific design is seen to extend."

That last sentence, as well as some of the early parts of his post, suggest that compared to twenty years ago, he now thinks that more of nature is designed. So maybe we are both right.

Behe's distinction between his views and Plantinga's, in my opinion, echoes the distinction I made between Behe's views and your own views. At times you, as a philosopher, understandably and appropriately seem to make philosophical statements. My point is simply that Behe's claims are more constrained because he wants them to be scientific, not metaphysical. His claims depend entirely on the particular cases he claims to have analyzed. To say that his argument is independent of his specific examples, or to say that the marvelous integrated complexity of life in general makes the case for design "obvious," is to depart from scientific argumentation of the kind Behe wants to make. It can be added to the science, yes, but it's not the same as the science.

You appear to be correct in stating that Behe today sees more extensive evidence for design than he was prepared to claim twenty years ago. Again, I think he failed to make his case in Edge of Evolution as much as he failed in Darwin's Black Box, but I agree with you that the claims of the two books differ at least in degree. The recent book claims more for design, and leaves less for contingency, than did his first book, though both books (as well as the web post) still allow a significant role for contingency.

Thanks again.

Chuck

Charles (Chuck) F. Austerberry, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Biology
Hixson-Lied Room 438
Creighton University
2500 California Plaza
Omaha, NE 68178
Phone: 402-280-2154
Fax: 402-280-5595
e-mail: cfauster@creighton.edu
http://groups.creighton.edu/premedsociety/
 
Nebraska Religious Coalition for Science Education
http://nrcse.creighton.edu
 
 

-----Original Message-----
------------------------------

Date: Mon, 16 Nov 2009 16:16:25 -0500
From: "Cameron Wybrow" <wybrowc@sympatico.ca>
Subject: Re: [asa] on science and meta-science

Charles:

Thanks for your comments. Since you've raised a reasonable doubt about the interpretation of Behe I've offered, I'll try to answer it as well as I can.

First, here is the statement of mine which you objected to:

>On the other hand, I think that what ID critics consistently miss is
>that ID is not merely an appeal to particular items, even if it uses
>such items, e.g., the flagellum, to make its point. If one looks
>carefully at Behe's arguments, for example, we see
that he is talking about very broad characteristics of cells and of living systems which bespeak a designing intelligence. Behe does not need the flagellum, except as an example, to point out the incredible level of integrated complexity that goes on in living things. The flagellum is a spectacular case, and easy to use for teaching purposes, because of the obvious mechanical analogy with a macroscopic item (an outboard motor). But every living cell, every bodily system, and just about every bodily process (think of embryonic development!), is every bit as marvellously integrated as the flagellum.

In the above statement, I may have read more into Behe's early arguments than is warranted. On the other hand, you may have underestimated the degree to which he sees design, even in his early works, and certainly in his later thinking, as penetrating nature deeply and broadly, and possibly detectable in more cases than the five given in *Darwin's Black Box*. But rather than argue it out, let me refer you to a recent public posting of his where he addresses the very question we are talking about, and perhaps says one or two things more clearly than he has in his books. The link is:

http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/11/god_design_and_contingency_in.html

After you have read this, let me know your thoughts. Does Behe's new statement match up with your previous interpretation of his writings, or does it differ? Does it make ID (or at least his version of ID) more or less palatable to you?

Cameron.

- ----- Original Message -----
From: "Austerberry, Charles F." <cfauster@creighton.edu>
To: <asa@lists.calvin.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 10, 2009 6:54 PM
Subject: Re: [asa] on science and meta-science

>I appreciate the precision of the dialogue between Cameron, Ted, Keith,
> and others about ID and TE.
>
> Three points:
>
> 1) The level playing field on which atheists and theists can equally do
> science refers to discovering nature, not understanding nature. By
> "understanding" I mean a much more expansive kind of knowledge than
> merely "discovering" the things in nature, how they work, their origins,
> and their changes over time. In other words, to understand nature
> requires more than what scientific explanation can provide. To
> understand nature also requires metaphysical reasoning. Atheistic
> metaphysical reasoning might not be able to reach an understanding of
> nature that is as complete, or as reasonable, as the understanding that
> some theistic metaphysical reasoning can achieve.
>
> 2) Cameron wrote: "On the other hand, I think that
> what ID critics consistently miss is that ID is not merely an appeal to
> particular items, even if it uses such items, e.g., the flagellum, to
> make
> its point. If one looks carefully at Behe's arguments, for example, we
> see
> that he is talking about very broad characteristics of cells and of
> living
> systems which bespeak a designing intelligence. Behe does not need the
> flagellum, except as an example, to point out the incredible level of
> integrated complexity that goes on in living things ...
> every living cell, every bodily system, and just about every bodily
> process
> (think of embryonic development!), is every bit as marvelously
> integrated
> as the flagellum."
>
> Perhaps we are reading different works by Behe. From what I've read of
> Behe's published works, and from my conversations with him at a
> conference as well as e-mail correspondence with him many years ago,
> Behe clearly thinks (or at least once thought) that scientific
> investigations could clearly distinguish between designed and
> non-designed parts of living things, and that there would be lots of
> both. He is (was?) not fond of sweeping statements to the effect that
> most everything in living organisms is/was "obviously" designed, at
> least not as scientific statements. Just the opposite. He insisted
> that for ID to truly be a science, it had to be able to distinguish
> between the designed and the non-designed parts of living organisms.
> When I and others asked him about various structures not discussed in
> his first book (this was shortly after he published Darwin's Black Box),
> he answered that he did not yet know whether they were designed but his
> approach could, at least in principle, distinguish between the designed
> and the non-designed. He predicted there would be surprises, of both
> kinds. Some things that look designed would turn out to have non-design
> explanations, while other things that seem simple would turn out to
> require design explanations. While he might personally share Cameron's
> awe for the marvelously complex integration of almost every part of
> every living thing, the Behe I know (knew?) clearly distinguished
> between such thinking and his scientific work. When doing what he felt
> was good science, he focused on specific examples. It was all
> case-by-case. Again, maybe I've missed something, such as an important
> shift in Behe's thinking. I'm just reporting what I saw and heard
> roughly twenty years ago.
>
> 3) The only sound arguments for design I've seen Behe or other ID
> proponents make have been for the design of man-made items. Outboard
> motors show evidence of design. So do houses, pyramids, computers,
> murders, etc. But when it comes to bacterial flagella, the vertebrate
> immune system, chloroquine resistance, etc. ... the arguments fail.
> They fail for diverse technical scientific reasons, reasons which a
> philosopher of science might trace back to some fundamental logical
> error, such as trying to detect design without specifying anything at
> all about the class, nature, or category of the designer beyond
> "intelligent."
>
> Cheers!
>
> Chuck
>
> Charles (Chuck) F. Austerberry, Ph.D.
> Assistant Professor of Biology
> Hixson-Lied Room 438
> Creighton University
> 2500 California Plaza
> Omaha, NE 68178
> Phone: 402-280-2154
> Fax: 402-280-5595
> e-mail: cfauster@creighton.edu
> http://groups.creighton.edu/premedsociety/
>
> Nebraska Religious Coalition for Science Education
> http://nrcse.creighton.edu
>
>
>
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Received on Tue Nov 17 11:20:13 2009